The Fool Who Follows
by LittleLotte17
Summary: Somewhere in between running for his life , dodging bullets, and calibrating big guns, Garrus Vakarian finds himself roped into helping Shepard deal with the complicated tangle of her emotions after Horizon. A task that's made even more daunting when he realizes that his feelings for the Commander might not be strictly platonic. FemShep/Garrus with a dash of Shenko.


AN: So, am I the only one who thought the way that Garrus suddenly jumps from being your awesome spacebro to 'sure, let's fuck' was really awkward and seemingly without any kind of preamble? No? Just me? And it _really _bugged me that he didn't even say anything about it if you had an LI from ME1. It just felt OOC. So, this is somewhat how I thought that in-between step should have gone, with, of course, some twists and turns unique to my own Shepard.

Disclaimer: Bioware owns all the characters. George Lucas/Disney (whoever) owns the Star Wars quote. No one sue me, I am poor.

Rated a heavy handed T: There is some mild cussing and some heavy stuff, both spoken and implied. I'm trusting everyone to be big kids.

* * *

Garrus felt his mandibles flutter anxiously against his cheeks as he shifted his weight from one long leg to the other, waiting for the elevator door to slide open. Already he could hear the rhythmic pounding accompanied by occasional grunts of frustration coming from the shuttle bay, and he tried to stifle a groan; this was going to be even more uncomfortable than he'd thought. Shepard had barricaded herself down here for close to eight hours, and somehow _he_ had been the one chosen to try and talk her down from either breaking her own fingers, or punching a hole through the Normandy's hull.

Horizon had been…bad. He wasn't exactly what you'd call a master of reading human body language, but even _he_ could tell that the tension between Shepard and Alenko had been thick enough to cut with- what was that human saying? A knife? Screw knives, you'd need some kind of buzz saw to hack your way through the animosity those two had been radiating.

Kaidan had taken Shepard's death hard- they all had, in their own ways, but when that last escape pod had opened and the only person inside was huddled in the corner, sobbing in a mix of guilt and pain from the multiple fractures in his arms and ribs…. The lieutenant had just sort of,shut down. There had been a flash of blind panic on his face, quickly followed by a dark shadow of grief the Turian recognized from when Williams had died, but Alenko had paused, taken a deep shuddering breath, and seemingly reeled it all back. There was no yelling, no crying, though Joker had certainly received more than one frigid glance, he'd just gone about his duties, stepping into his CO's shoes without fuss or fanfare. He had closed himself off from everyone, distanced himself from a reality he wasn't equipped to deal with, pointedly avoiding the hot mess of tears that was Liara and a softly sniffling Tali.

But when the shelters had been erected and the distress beacon activated, the human male had sat outside in the cold late into the night, staring up into the black void. Waiting. Hoping beyond all reason that the woman he loved would make another miraculous reappearance, would somehow manage to cheat death again. Garrus knew, because he'd been there, waiting for the exact same thing, and if there was one thing that the Turian had learned from his years at C-sec, it wasn't the ones that screamed and cried and threatened you that you had to worry about. It was the quiet ones, the ones bottling up all their rage and hate and sorrow, that you had to watch. They were the loaded gun waiting to be fired.

The shot he'd been waiting for went off when help arrived in the form of a Turian frigate, and they had to leave the planet without her. It felt like losing her all over again, like signing her death certificate, like giving up on her; impossible and _ wrong_. And then some smart-ass private had been dumb enough to make a crack about how apparently Commander Shepard needed a Prothean vision to know when _any_ kind of attack was coming, which had earned him a one-way flight into a bulkhead in a blaze of the human staff lieutenant's biotics, without so much as a 'shut-the-fuck-up' glare as a warning. Then Garrus had to try and talk both sides down, even though he had been just as quick to draw his weapon as any other member of Shepard's squad, ready to 'correct' anyone else who thought their friend hadn't been every inch the hero the vids made her out to be. Kaidan had spent the rest of the trip back to the Citadel in the brig, while the private had spent it in the med-bay, but at least they had avoided an official inter-species incident.

Then, there had been the paparazzi at her funeral. The empty casket. Alenko's usually gentle features hardening to something cold and resentful. Anderson's strong voice breaking repeatedly throughout the eulogy. The trembling in Tali's shoulders. Joker's silence. Liara's unstoppable tears. Garrus had watched it all with something along the lines of resignation, returning to C-sec with his tail between his legs and trying to ignore how boring life without Shepard was, how frustrating, how lonely.

The Turian paused mid-step, wondering when he had gone form thinking about how rough it had been on Kaidan without Shepard, to how rough it had been on _him_. He looked up to see the woman in question standing in a corner of the shuttle bay that had been transformed into a makeshift gym, beating the shit out of a punching bag, and covered head to toe in sweat. It was always strange to see her out of her hard suit, she looked so much smaller, more _delicate_, in nothing but a grey tank top and a pair of worn black leggings, it was hard to imagine that this was a woman whose favorite pastime was slamming a biocticly enhanced fist into the faces of enemies twice her bodyweight.

Her gaze flicked over to him, her strange bright grey-violet irises sending him a clear signal to either piss off or face the consequences. They had never managed to get that color just right in the vids. He remembered feeling haunted every time he went on patrol, with the approximation of her face looking over his shoulder from almost every wall in the wards. But apparently she hadn't been good enough to be 'The Savior of the Citadel,' even after pulling the council's collective asses out of the fire. Only a few months after her death, they had started slowly modifying her image into something the general public would find more 'attractive'. Her scars had been the first thing to go; the gruesome slash that curved from her right temple and almost reached her mouth, the diagonal slice across her full lips, the left ear partially eaten by the acid of the thresher maw that had taken out the rest of her old squad: gone. He hadn't liked it, but he supposed it made her less intimidating, which is why he hadn't made a fuss when they gave her a sweet smile or softened her features into something more complacent either.

It wasn't until 'Savior of the Citadel: The Shepard Story', hit the big screen that he'd finally had enough. They'd portrayed her as some buxom doe-eyed bimbo who ran around in a skin-tight bodysuit, which was always half unzipped, and was always finding provocative ways of posing with her gun while her long chestnut hair billowed in the nonexistent wind. If she'd been alive, Shepard would have laughed at it, hell, the whole squad might have taken shore leave together to go see it; it would have been fun. Instead, it had just kicked him somewhere soft, and pissed him off in a way he hadn't been since his investigation of Saren had been halted by the red tape of bureaucracy. He'd quit C-sec the next day, and been on a ship heading towards the Terminus systems by the end of the next week, full of righteous indignation, cooking up half-baked schemes, and itching for a fight.

It seemed like Shepard was always the one pulling his life hard to starboard and dragging him into trouble, in the best way, of course. He'd been miserable at C-sec for years, but he doubted that he would have actually done anything about it until a certain Alliance Commander had come storming through that clinic door and bitched at him for shooting at a merc who had a hostage. Shepard had become someone he looked up to, and one of his best friends, and…and right now she was glaring at him like she was about to rearrange his face.

"Get. Out." She growled, breathing heavily as she paused her assault on the punching bag. She took a moment to wipe the sweat from her face with a towel, scrubbing at the auburn stubble of her crew cut hair as she did so. Garrus briefly wondered what she'd look like if she ever _did_ grow it out long enough to blow in the nonexistent wind, the words that came to mind were, _soft _and..._weird_. He took a half-step towards her.

"Shepard…" He began hesitantly.

"_Leave_, Vakarian." She cut him off, bringing her fists back up and shifting into a fighting stance, "That's an order, not a suggestion."

"Well, I've never been one to follow dumb orders, Commander." He shrugged, "I guess that makes me a bad Turian."

"I'm not asking you to be a good Turian, Garrus," She sighed, crossing her arms and turning to face him directly, "I'm asking you to be a good _friend_. I really just want to be left alone right now; think you can do that for me?"

"A good friend is exactly what I'm being, Shepard." The Turian replied, cocking his head to one side and leaning back against a nearby crate. "You haven't exactly been social this past week…. So, you can't just disappear to the shuttle bay for almost half a day and not expect someone to check up on you."

"And what, you lost the coin toss or something?" She scoffed.

"Actually, between me, Joker, and Dr. Chakwas, I was voted 'least likely to die' if you decided to be your usual charming self and respond to emotions by hitting things." He admitted, mandibles flaring in a brief grin.

"Given your vendetta against Sidonis, I don't think you have a lot of room to lecture me on violent emotional responses, Garrus." She said coldly, turning away from him and delivering a series of sharp jabs and a powerful roundhouse kick against the unsuspecting sandbag. The Turian felt every muscle in his body tense, but he held his ground, knowing that losing his temper and storming off was exactly the reaction Shepard was going for.

"I hardly think that my _entire team_ getting wiped out is comparable to your boyfriend dumping you." He ground out, trying to keep as much spite out his voice as he could, which wasn't much. She ignored him, but the sound of her blows landing became almost deafening. "You're head isn't in the game, Shepard." He continued, knowing he was probably digging a pit for himself, but past caring. "Getting riled up over something personal can cost lives in our line of work; you know that. Letting something like this get under your skin just isn't like you."

Garrus felt his head slam back against the crates he'd been leaning on, his vision swam, making him only vaguely aware of the gently glowing fist that had just pummeled the unscarred half of his face. The hit itself wasn't really that bad, when you considered that Shepard was almost completely burned out, and that she hadn't been _trying_ to kill him. So, even though it still hurt like hell, it was mostly surprise that made his knees buckle. Well, that and the full weight of another person collapsing on top of him.

Pure instinct made Garrus latch on to the pile of human that had suddenly staggered into his lap, pinning her to him with his lean arms. Even if it was a bit like grabbing a varren by the tail, at least it kept her from either running away or beating the shit out of him. Not that she didn't _try_, if her writhing limbs and rather colorful protestations were any indication, but he knew that Shepard had to be at the end of her strength if something as simple as throwing a right hook could upset her balance.

Sure enough, her struggling soon gave way to exhausted shuddering, but somehow that led to quiet sobbing, and _Spirits_, did he not know what to do with _that_. Garrus knew that for all her stupid amounts of luck, impressive combat skills, and general krogan-like stubbornness, at the end of the day; Shepard was a real person. She told bad jokes, she could be a spoiled brat, she got depressed, she could bleed…and she could die. Still, he never thought he'd ever see her like this, laying a crumpled heap and crying. It was so _vulnerable_, and even if they'd been close back in their days aboard the old SR1, he never thought she would let her shields down this far, not for _him_ anyway.

"Shepard…." He whispered gently, relaxing his grip and moving one hand up to touch her shoulder. She suddenly seemed so small.

"You _can't _say that." Her voice sounded wet and angry coming from the crook of her elbow where she'd hidden her face. "If _you_ start doubting who I am, I won't have anyone…. You _can't_, Garrus…not you, too."

"I-I didn't mean it like _that_," The Turian sputtered. She pounded a fist into his shoulder weakly: '_I don't believe you'_. He heaved a sigh, "Look, Alenko will come around. The last couple of years have been pretty tough on him, but I know he cares a lot about you. Give him some time; I'm sure he'll be bombarding your e-mail with apologies before you know it."

She shifted slightly against him, moving to rest her chin on the collar of his armor and peer up at him with damp piercing eyes. He had to crane his neck to meet her gaze, but he held it, trying to convey sincerity and support, with his arms in a loose circle around her waist. Turians weren't exactly a touchy-feely bunch, traditionally military families like the Vakarians in particular, so he was at a bit of a loss as to what kind of physicality would be considered consoling, and what might earn him another punch in the face. Humans were weird like that, especially Shepard. When he'd first joined her team he'd thought she was cold, distant even, but he'd slowly noticed that Kaidan, Ashley, and even Tali could usually pick up on her moods, even though she never seemed to give off many normal expressive cues.

He started watching her, intent on unlocking the tells of her emotions, mostly for the sake of becoming a more cohesive part of her team, but he'd be lying if said that it had nothing to do with is own curiosity. Before long he could spot the frustration in the way she rubbed her hands over the short bristle of her hair, the stubborn clench of her jaw that spoke of pride, the tension in her shoulders that whispered of fear, or the mischief in her eyes that hinted at laughter. But more than anything, he saw the way she avoided most physical contact the same way a turian avoids a swimming pool, and how the repercussions of getting into what Shepard considered her personal space without a good reason tended to end in violence. The fact that the same woman who had pinned a crewman to the ground for tapping her on the shoulder was now letting herself be comforted by his awkward embrace was more than enough to put him on edge.

She was silent for a long time, and he wasn't sure if she was contemplating the truth of what he'd said, or if she was trying to see if it was possible for humans to mind meld like the Asari did. He hoped it was the former. The quiet gave him a moment to realize how…_intimate_ their position was. He was slumped on the floor of an empty shuttle bay, leaning back against some crates, with the human woman who served as his commanding officer sitting half way in his lap and sprawled partially across his chest. Not only that, but it was _Shepard_, the Spectre who had saved the galaxy, the same woman who was hard pressed to give a handshake to someone she hadn't known for at least a month, and the person that Garrus trusted more than anyone. The thought made something flutter in the pit of his stomach, and he wondered why she didn't pull away from him, now that she could…and why he really didn't mind that she hadn't.

"He already messaged me," she said finally, still staring up at his face, looking for something, "last night."

"Oh." Was all Garrus could reply, waiting for the other shoe to drop, knowing it couldn't have been good if her response had been to come down here and beat the crap out of things for eight straight hours.

"Yeah," She sighed, sitting up straight, "there wasn't exactly a lot of begging for forgiveness involved. He mostly just threw himself a pity party and told me that maybe, after this _suicide mission_ I've signed up for, we can start talking again." She gave a bitter laugh, "With our luck, I'll probably be a corpse again by the time he's decided to forgive me for, 'betraying everything we stood for'." His throat tightened at the words '_corpse again',_ and he swallowed thickly.

"Shepard, I'm…sorry." He finished lamely. She shrugged, not meeting his eyes.

"I understand not wanting to leave the Alliance," She began slowly, "and hell, I don't blame him for not taking everything I said at face value. I know _I'd_ doubt the word of someone I knew had been flushed into space with a suit rupture, but…."

"But?" He prompted quietly.

"But he's _Kaidan_!" She whimpered, as if that was explanation enough, and it was, for Garrus at least. He'd seen the way she'd been when he first joined the Normady's crew, confident, but cagey, like she was crouched in anticipation of some unforeseen blow, and he'd watched as the Lieutenant's patient attentions had ever so slowly broken down their Commander's walls. It was like she'd finally let go of the breath she'd been holding, and when she did, she'd discovered that she was actually capable of happiness. The amazement it left in her expressions made her seem younger, more approachable; it had been a refreshing change. Shepard had always been kind, but she tended to come off as…_abrasive_. Kaidan seemed to smooth her edges a bit, and the Turian swore he'd even seen her let him hold her hand once. He'd been happy for them.

"Whenever I told him about whatever dumb-as-shit mission we were about to go do, he just said, 'Right behind you, Shepard.' And he was... always, _always_." She paused to press the heels of her hands into her eyes and took a few deep shaky breaths. "He had my respect... my _trust_..." She trailed off, unwilling or unable to finish the sentiment with _'my heart.'_

She started fidgeting with her hands and her face turned a pinkish color Garrus had come to associate with either anger or embarrassment in humans, though he wasn't used to seeing much of the latter in Shepard. "He told me..._things_. Things that I wanted to believe in, things that I needed to be true... It felt good. For the first time, it felt like..._family_."

"Have any of those things changed?" Garrus asked, "Alenko is probably the most straight shooting guy I've ever met, Shepard, and I'm a _Turian_, my people would probably explode without some kind of regs to follow. No way he was ever playing you."

"It's not that I think he was lying," She sighed, "I just don't think what he said _then_ is true _now_. He's not the same soldier who stood with me at the battle of the Citadel, told me so himself...and he doesn't think I'm the person he followed back then either."

"Sooo, what?" Garrus asked incredulously, "You're just going to cut ties and run because two years of solid mourning changes a person? _Spirits_, be reasonable, Shepard! You've got to understand what he's been throu-"

"_Fuck_ that, Garrus!" She cut him off, "I'm sick of people telling me to '_understand_' what they've been through! _You're_ the ones who don't understand!"

"Then _make_ me understand!" He snapped, his temper finally getting the better of him. He was too used to leaning on her to know what to do when the shoe was on the other foot. _Damn_, he knew Chakwas should have been the one to handle this.

"**FINE!**" She pounded on his shoulder again, a little more forceful with rage to fuel it. "You want the shitty sobby details? You can fucking _have_ them, Vakarian, and I hope you choke on them, you _ass_!" She hunched over him, trembling, her head bent low enough to rest against his chest and her breathing coming in ragged gasps. When she started speaking again her voice was low and dangerous.

"Imagine being cold- the coldest you've ever been- so much so that the air in your lungs feels like ice, and it burns every time you inhale, and you try not to panic when you do, because the only thing you can hear in the silence surrounding you is the hiss from the leak in your hard suit and your own pulse pounding in your ears, and you know you're only alive for as long as both of those sounds continue."

Garrus desperately wanted to _not_ be hearing about this, but he'd asked for it, and it felt like if he stopped her now, she'd never talk about it again, to _anyone_. And he could tell Shepard needed this. So, he gripped her shoulders, though he wasn't sure which of them it was supposed to be comforting, and continued listening with an air of horrified awe.

"Your first instinct is to struggle, to fight with everything you have against death, but there is _nothing_. Nothing to grab, or hit, or shoot- there's only you and the endless vacuum of space. The scraps of the Normandy drift around you like fragments of old memories, and you suddenly notice how far away the stars seem, and how the planet below you keeps getting bigger. The adrenaline your body produces in a pointless attempt to save itself speeds up your heart rate and robs you of a few last seconds of air. Each limb slowly loses feeling as your hard suit shuts down. You scan the horizon one last time, hoping against hope that you'll see another ship coming, knowing the Alliance could still save you if they'd just _get here_. Your brain skitters over everything you've ever experienced, mostly dumb things, they seem so important now…a stupid joke you once heard, Quarian curse words, the first time you ate a _real_ apple, acid burning along the side of your face, a brave woman reading you poetry, a lover's breath lingering in your mouth…. And just before everything fades to black, you look down at the planet beneath you and wonder if you'll feel it when you hit atmo- if you'll already be dead by then."

"_Spirits_," Garrus manages to breathe out, trying to pull her down into a bear hug, only to be halted by her arms braced against his chest.

"I wasn't done yet," She hissed at him, her violet eyes burning. "The next time you wake up, and I'm mean_ really_ wake up, not the strange half-dreams that seem to keep pulling you in and out of death, you're surrounded by gunfire and distant screams, and you think to yourself, '_God, the Normandy is still going down_,' until you realize that the voice on the comm belongs to a woman, and not Joker…. And you just run and shoot and fight and breathe, because its all you _can _do, and it feels _so good_ to know that any of those things are even an option. Then, a couple of Cerberus lackeys in too-tight bodysuits that they laughingly call armor start bickering back and forth over what to do with you, like you're some special needs kid stuck in the middle of a nasty divorce, and you ignore them, partially because they annoy the piss out of you, but mostly because the words '_two years_'and '_meat and tubes_' have finally sunk in…."

"Every time your eyes close, you find yourself back there, helpless and drifting, waiting to die. The memory of it terrifies you, but you cling to it anyway, because it's the last time you know with absolute certainty that you were who you think you are now. Strangers call you by the name you remember, and you try to convince yourself that it's enough to prove who you are. It's the only thing that gets you through the night, when you wake up drenched in a cold sweat, convinced that this time -_this time_- you really are dead... and then all you can think of is..._'two years'_ and _'meat and tubes'._ Meat. And. _Tubes_, Garrus. Can you _understand_ that?"

The Turian's stomach squirmed unpleasantly at the thought, but he managed a brief jerk of his head in affirmation. She let him hold her then, and he tried not to think too hard about how strange it felt to have her curled up against him, not like a lover, or even a friend, but more like a child, vulnerable and scared. At least she wasn't crying any more.

"I'm not sure who I am anymore, Garrus…. Hell, I'm not even sure _what_ I am," She sighed, "But I thought I knew_ him_. Someone who accuses me of not contacting him for two years because he thinks that I…I don't even know…I faked my own death to join a terrorist movement? He wouldn't even _listen_ to my side of things- too wrapped up in his own damn feelings to _consider _what the truth might be! That's not _my_ Kaidan…that's not the man I lo-...cared about."

The Turian's mind drifted back two years ago, to a dark haired human in his Alliance dress blues standing stiffly at a podium in front of a hushed crowd. All through Anderson and Hackett's cut and dry speeches about the bravery of soldiers, and Udina's dull pomp and circumstance about the 'pride and strength of humanity,' there had been muffled whispers and sniffling, even a chuckle here and there from a few reporters who apparently wanted their limbs broken later, but the minute Kaidan had stepped onto that stage it had gotten quiet enough to hear a pin drop. Her death clung to him as a nearly palpable force, and the weight of it showed heavily in his gaze as it flicked briefly over the assembly. He pulled something from his pocket, a slender, shabby, real-as-life, leather bound book, which he opened to a marked page and began reading without ceremony or preamble.

"Dead men naked they shall be one

With the man in the wind and the west moon;

When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,

They shall have stars at elbow and foot;

Though they go mad they shall be sane,

Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;

Though lovers be lost love shall not;

And death shall have no dominion."

His piece said, he had turned to the large projection of the Commander's face above the casket beside him. It was the picture from her personnel file- the only one anyone had of her- and the expression was blank and cold, she stared back down at her lover with distant pixilated eyes. The Staff Lieutenant had managed a steady voice throughout his reading, even the part about, '_though lovers be lost_,' but it splintered abruptly with two little words: '_Goodbye, Nimm_.'

"I think that man died the minute we opened that last escape pod and you weren't in it, Shepard." Garrus told her solemnly.

"Then maybe _that_ Shepard should stay dead with him." She replied bitterly.

"Don't say things like that," Her friend scolded sharply, his arms tightening around her for a moment, "You _are_ Shepard. The same crazy woman who dragged me half way around the galaxy chasing down rogue Specters, Geth, and Spirits know what else. "

"And you loved every minute of it." She snorted in good humor.

"Some days were decidedly better than others," he remarked quietly.

"Yeah…" She trailed off, her thoughts undoubtedly heading somewhere dark, and Garrus instantly regretted his habit of never being able to quit when he was ahead.

"You know, I closed my eyes for what felt like a minute, and the next time I opened them, everything I thought I knew, everything I thought I _had_…was gone." Her voice had dropped to almost a whisper. "I tried to find him- tried to find _all_ of you- as soon as I had access to the extranet, but…whether it was Cerberus interference or just bad luck, none of my messages seemed to get through. I even asked Anderson if he could pass one along to Kaidan for me…but I guess he didn't."

"He might not have been able to," Garrus reasoned, "It sounds like Alenko has been doing a lot of Spec Ops work lately, and even Anderson can't break the rules all the time."

"I know," She sighed, shifting her arms so she was partially returning his embrace. "I…I'm just so _tired_."

Garrus said nothing, simply looked down at the autumn colored fuzz blanketing the scalp resting against him, the long fringe of lashes under her dark worried brows, the round shell of her should-be-scarred ear, the slightly upward tilt of her protruding nose…she was so _human_. And _so_ alive. He found these thoughts both perplexed and endeared her to him. He knew Shepard needed someone in her corner right now, and if he was being honest with himself, after what had happened to his own team, Garrus was eager to feel like he was part something important again. He liked the idea of looking out for her, protecting the galaxy's protector. She was obviously bad at knowing her own limits, and with Alenko seemingly out of the picture...

He quickly put a stopper on that line of thinking. Kaidan was still his friend, even if he was being a bit pig-headed, and the Turian knew that he had no business meddling with whatever relationship the man still had with Shepard. Giving her an ear and making sure she kept the 'stupid' to a minimum was one thing, but trying to step into the biotic's shoes as her right hand man, as if _he_ could be some kind of replacement…that was something else entirely. Besides, he wasn't even _attracted_ to humans….

Shepard made a noise somewhere between a grunt and a whimper, and the Turian blinked down at her in surprise. She had fallen asleep on top of him, curled up like some kind of content domestic house pet. Garrus' mandibles gave a self-conscious flutter and he felt his heart do a funny sort of lurch in his chest. Well…_shit_.

Moving her as gently as possible, Garrus negotiated Shepard's limbs so that her legs were being supported by one arm, while his other arm wrapped around her shoulders. He went through a brief struggle to get back on his feet without jostling his passenger, before beginning a slow awkward kind of hobble back towards the elevator. She was actually surprisingly light, considering that she was tall for a human and most of her body mass was pure muscle, but he only had a very basic knowledge of human anatomy, mostly involving where to aim fists and bullets, and the last thing he wanted was for his commanding officer to wake up and beat him to a bloody pulp for accidentally groping her.

Garrus had a nice long ride in the elevator to fret about his earlier reaction to Shepard's proximity, and the odd spiral his recent thought patterns seemed to be taking. He tried to shrug it off, reasoning that he hadn't been spending a lot of time with _anything_ female for close to a year, never mind a woman of his own species, but there was an annoyingly loud voice in the back of his mind pointing out that he wouldn't have gotten flustered about Miranda or Jack falling asleep on him...just creeped out. He was willing to bet the level of fear he harbored that any of these women could've woken up and decided to throw him around the room like a rag doll was about the same, however.

He knew that plenty of turians found asari attractive, so it wasn't like there was some kind of huge social stigma attached to dating outside of his race, but humans and turians still harbored resentments from the First Contact War, so asking one to be his girlfriend wouldn't garnish him a lot of friends back home. Not to mention the fact that they couldn't even eat the same things, so any kind of serious intimacy would cause compli-…. Wait, now he was thinking about asking her out? _Double _shit.

"Can you get the door, EDI?" the Turian grunted when he was finally standing outside Shepard's quarters.

"Of course, Garrus." Came the AI's immediate reply, either unaware or unperturbed by the frustration in his tone; it slid the door open without further comment. He took another long look at Shepard as he carefully set her down on her bed. She was still completely passed out, immediately pulling her knees up into a fetal position and stretching her arms back out towards him, as if seeking his suddenly absent body heat. He grinned at the thought, studying the way her little pink mouth parted with the heavy breaths of a deep tranquil sleep, admiring the curve of her pale throat, and noticing the faint dusting of freckles across her nose for the first time…. Kaidan was an idiot.

Spirits alone knew what made him do it, but for some mad reason, he suddenly decided that he wanted to know what her hair felt like. Human hair had always been something of a curiosity for him; they were always growing it long or cutting it short or dying it odd colors. It apparently had something to do with attracting the opposite sex, but he couldn't fathom what the appeal could be, except that it must be nice to touch. Admittedly, Shepard didn't have much to offer in that department, but he doubted he'd ever get another opportunity to find out for himself without either looking like a weirdo or getting slapped upside the head.

He removed one three fingered glove and slowly reached out to touch her. His fingers travelled in a gentle arc from the top of her head, around her ear, and down one side of her face. The gingery stubble of her hair lightly tickled at his palm, and her skin was incredibly soft and warm. All in all, he was considering it to be a risk well worth taking, until he felt the death grip clamp down on his wrist.

"I trust you, Garrus." Shepard whispered darkly, her glare was like an icy lavender stasis beam in the dim lighting of her cabin, freezing him to the spot, "And because I trust you, I want you to understand how _incredibly_ calm I'm being right now, when I could be turning you into a big blue smear on the floor. So, I suggest you explain what the _hell _you think you were doing. Right. Now."

Garrus was incredibly mortified, more than a little petrified, and maybe even slightly terrified, because no one delivered on a death threat quiet like Shepard, and right now those blazing violet eyes were promising him a world of hurt. His mind scrambled for a way to escape the situation without damaging either his vitals or his pride. When he realized that there wasn't one, he sighed heavily and hurriedly mumbled an explanation.

"What was that?" She asked breezily, her grasp tightening around his wrist painfully.

"Ouch!" He complained, "I said, I was just curious!"

"About?" She prompted, her voice getting dangerous again.

"Your…um, hair?" He finally managed to reply.

"My…_really_?" She dropped his wrist in favor of reaching up to rub a hand over the area in question. She glanced back up at her friend, watching him anxiously shift from one foot to the other, massaging his abused limb, and looking every bit like he wanted a hole to disappear into. She burst out laughing.

"I just wanted to know what it fel- shut up, Shepard!" He said defensively before breaking out into a dry chuckle himself.

"Of- of _all_ the humans you could have picked," she gasped out between helpless peals of mirth, "I think _Joker_ has longer hair than I do!"

It was nice to relax like this with her; his mood felt lighter than it had been in a long time. There hadn't been much to laugh about since the destruction of the SR1, and what was left of his good humor had died back with his squad on Omega. That is, until Shepard had walked back into his life through a hail of gunfire to pull his ass out of the frying pan. He barely had one foot out of the med bay before her good natured ribbing was testing the limits of his fresh skin grafts.

All too soon, the laughter faded away and was replaced by an awkward silence. If Garrus was going to take a stab at guessing what emotion was hiding in those pale violet eyes, he would have gone with a perplexed and slightly anxious ambivalence. He was wondering if she was about to go back to threatening his life again, when she finally spoke.

"You know, Garrus..." she said slowly, her tone grave, "I really don't like being randomly _man-handled_. Its kind of a..._thing_ with me."

"I know-" He quickly fumbled, "I wasn't thinking, it was stupid- I'm sorry, Shepard. I didn't mean-"

"I know." She cut him off. She gave him another long searching look before sitting up fully on the bed and gesturing for him to join her. He complied with only the briefest flash of confusion, Shepard was about as touchy-feely as a Krogan in a blood rage, and this scene had all the makings of a bad porno. Common sense was telling him to get the hell out of there and go back to the safety of calibrating big guns, but the same part of him that had raged at the people who had disregarded her warnings and called her crazy, and whimpered quietly at her death, couldn't bear the thought of leaving her now, when she was so obviously beaten down.

"So...is turnabout fair play here?" She asked, raising a hand slowly and reaching out to him, the expression on her face carefully neutral.

To say that he was surprised would have been a monumental understatement. Garrus had troubles figuring out how to deal with women of his own species, and here was Shepard, all squishy and human, looking at him with _those eyes_...and he had no fucking clue how he was supposed to react to this. But whether it was because of his explicit trust in the first human Spectre, or whatever voodoo her gaze was working on him right now, he found himself tilting his head towards her in a wordless invitation.

The tough carapace protecting his face and skull dulled the sensation of her touch somewhat, unlike the softness of her skin beneath his hand, but there was a definite warmth in her hesitant fingers that he found utterly intoxicating. He wanted to lean farther into this- into _her_. But Garrus knew better- knew _Shepard _better- than that. No matter what magic spell of fatigue and heartache had brought them to this place together, he was well aware that her heart was still a million light-years away, all wrapped up in a pair of big does eyes and Alliance blues.

It could have been mere minutes, it could have been days, the Turian wasn't quite sure how long they sat there in the dark with her hand skimming lightly from the top of his brow-plate to the tips of his crest. She was petting him in a way he was sure he should have been indignant about, but if he was being completely honest with himself, he found it incredibly soothing, and vaguely erotic. He wasn't even aware that he'd closed his eyes until he heard Shepard laughing again.

"You're _purring_, Garrus." She sniggered at him.

"I'm not a housecat, Shepard." He said defensively, "Turians don't purr."

"Right, right, simply a figment of my imagination then." She replied smugly.

"Well, I _have_ always said you were crazy." He reminded her pointedly.

"Who's more foolish; the fool, or the fool who follows her?" She asked with an air of mock innocence.

"Hey, I said you were _crazy_, not-" But his words died in his throat when he felt her fingers ghost over the bandaged half of his face.

"Does it still hurt?" Shepard asked quietly.

"Only when someone pokes at it." He said dryly. She winced, pulling her hand away.

"Sorry." She grimaced, looking frustrated. "And...I'm sorry I didn't stop it. I should have been better about watching your back."

"I'm pretty sure you saved my life, Shepard." He reminded her gently. "I think I can handle a few extra scars." He reached up slowly, giving her a chance to stop him if she wanted to, and touched her left ear with his ungloved hand. "Speaking of which, you seem to have lost a few of your own landmarks somewhere along the way. Cerberus should have been more thorough."

"I sort of miss them." She admitted, squirming uncomfortably. "Can I- ask an awkward question?"

"Sure, Shepard." He shrugged, privately thinking that there wasn't much more that could make this entire encounter any more awkward than it already was.

"How did you know it was me? Even Tali was second guessing me back on Freedom's Progress before I asked about those Geth data drives we found for her pilgrimage, and we both saw how Kaidan reacted...but not you. You trusted me on sight...why?" Her gaze had shifted into something unreadable again, and he knew she was holding herself back, bracing for whatever curveball life decided to throw at her this time. Garrus felt his mandibles twitch in the Turian approximation of a grin.

"You've still got all the same tells, Shepard." He told her sincerely. "You've got the same gate to your walk, you still worry the place your lip used to be scarred when you're focused on something, you roll your eyes the same way when someone's annoying you, and when you found out Archangel was me, you rubbed the place just behind your left ear where the Thresher Maw scars used to be- an obvious sign of anxiety. Cerberus might have given you a new coat of paint, but the insides seem to be the original make and model to me."

"I didn't know you were watching me so closely, Vakarian." She laughed, her smile bright and completely contagious.

"You're a hard person to forget, Shepard." And maybe his tone was a little too gentle, a little too sad, but thankfully the human seemed blissfully unaware of his slip up.

"I never pegged you as the sentimental type, Garrus." She chuckled before fighting down a fierce yawn. "I guess I really should get some shuteye before the universe needs me to blow up another Reaper, or something." He nodded silently, getting up and walking towards the door to her cabin.

"Sweet dreams, Shepard." He called out over his shoulder as he ascended the stairs near the fish tank.

"Hmm, thanks, Garrus. For everything." She mumbled sleepily, "You're one of the best friends I've ever had..." Her voice trailed away and was quickly doused by heavy even breathing. He felt something swell in his chest, something light, something proud, and that damned fluttering was back. _Spirits_, what was wrong with him?!

Something on her desk caught his eye as he was heading out the door. A picture? He took a step closer to discover that the screen was badly cracked, a spider web of fractures obscuring most of it's occupant. Still, there was no hiding that familiar dark sweep of hair, or the faint smile on those full lips. So gentle. So human.

Garrus could imagine it almost as clearly as a vid; Shepard screaming in frustration and hurt, throwing the image of her former lover across the room in a blind rage. Perhaps she'd simply smashed it with her fist- she'd always been a fan of punching things. Then, she would have stopped, her breath ragged, her chest aching, and realized what she'd done, and the regret would be instantaneous- she'd destroyed that last link she had to him. And now, the picture had made it back to her desk and was peacefully sitting upright as though it hadn't been on the receiving end of a seriously pissed off Spectre, arranged gingerly, by hands still trembling in grief no doubt, so she could still see the remnants of his face as she worked at her private terminal.

Garrus felt the swelling pride from mere moments ago begin to plummet down into the pit of his stomach like a stone dropped into a well. His shoulders slumped as he walked out the door and began his trek back down to the main battery. His head was a complete tangle, but one thing was certain: Kaidan Alenko might have been an idiot, but Garrus Vakarian was a fool.

* * *

AN: Also The poem Kaidan read is 'And Death Shall Have No Dominion' by Dylan Thomas. Please R&R! Thanks!


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